


The Woman

by VeryImportantDemon



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alexander’s death, Canonical Character Death, Character Death, Death, F/M, Gen, M/M, Prose piece, Read into whatever other relationship you want, reflections
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-30
Updated: 2017-11-30
Packaged: 2019-02-08 16:18:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12868323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VeryImportantDemon/pseuds/VeryImportantDemon
Summary: He sees her across from him. She is so beautiful that his heart constricts in his chest and his breath catches in his throat.Or: Alexander dies.





	The Woman

**Author's Note:**

> can u say what the fuck vaguely inspired by a piece by ziksua on instagram

He sees her across from him. She is so beautiful that his heart constricts in his chest and his breath catches in his throat. And she is so kind, too. He can see her kindness, feel her kindness, even from this far away. He can tell because she is smiling, so wide that she shows every one of her teeth and her eyes are nearly closed. She is so happy to see him that she smiles this big, and that warms his heart even more. She is perfect, this woman. Amazingly, wonderfully, beautifully perfect. She is perfect, too, because she loves him. After everything he does, she still loves him. Loves him with all her heart. So, he smiles, too.

  
His smile isn’t as big as hers. It is smaller but it is no less happy. His lips barely quirk upward, his eyes downcast. He thinks while he smiles. Thinks of better times. He recalls a ballroom, spinning, dancing bodies pressing against each other, a blue dress swirling around her ankles, a tender kiss on the cheek. A white veil, beautiful flowers, a beautiful bride. A boy with curly hair missing a tooth, smiling up at him with that same smile. An almost-forgotten touch of hands, so light the skin hardly remembers. A garden. A city. Another garden. A house. He thinks, also, that there is something on his chin.

  
He is confused now. Tears, perhaps? But they are low on his face, under his lip. Surely there wouldn’t be tears under his lip… His cheeks aren’ t even wet. He touches his cheeks with his fingertips, lightly, and they come away dry. He touches his chin, pulls his fingers away, and they come away red. Red, red, red. Scarlet like a dress. His eyes widen in shock. Red. What is redder than blood? Blood. He spits blood, swallows it, chokes on it. He drowns in an endless sea of it and suddenly he is 17 again and he is drowning. He isn’t 17, but he is drowning.

  
He is 47 years old. He is 47 years old and he drowns not in water but in blood. He wears not a resplendent uniform, blue and gold, but black, round glasses sliding off of his nose. He looks up sharply while he starts to fall, desperately trying to catch a glimpse of the woman. Where is she? Where is his beautiful woman? His heart hurts and his breath catches but not because of how in love he is. His heart hurts and his breath catches because he is dying. He is dying, and he doesn’t find the woman. Where is she? Where is she? _Where is she?_ He wants her. He wants her now. He wants the woman, he thinks, his eyes wide with panic. But he looks up and he sees not the woman but a man.

  
He looks down the barrel of a gun again. Smoke curls from the barrel up into the air and he follows it with his eyes until it disappears. He drags his eyes down and he sees the man. His eyes are wide, too, wide with fear and pain and disbelief and shock. He doesn’t understand, that is plain to see. The sun catches something in his eyes, too. A drop of water that slides down his chin, drops to the grass, sinks into the ground, and disappears.

  
He follows it, crumpling to the ground, his chin still red as he starts to fall. His arm is still in the air and he just realizes this as he falls. He forces his fingers to squeeze tightly, hugging the cool metal in his hand. He doesn’t drop the gun. Why this is so important to him, he doesn’t know, but it _is_. It is so important to him that he does not drop the gun. He clings to it, and as he falls, he thinks about the woman again.

  
The woman returns to him, but she is too late. She is too late to save him. He sees them, he sees the children lined up by his bedside, sees every one of them, even the baby, as tears start to roll down his cheeks, tears he can’t control as he drowns and dies slowly and agonizingly. They are not the only people he sees. He sees another boy beside his bed, his child. A boy with curly hair and a gap-toothed smile. He sees a tall young man standing beside the boy, the young man’s hair pulled back behind his face, showing freckles and a smile so wide it lights up the room. He sees a woman he hasn’t seen in years, her face lined with wrinkles. She looks sad, suffering, but she smiles when their eyes meet. Beside her, he sees another man. A tall man with no hair and a sword at his hip. His eyes fill with tears and as they start to roll down his cheeks, he lifts his hand in a salute. He is the only one that moves. He does not see the man waiting outside the door, lingering like he is somewhere he shouldn’t be, and he does not see that man leave to never return. He blinks and when he opens his eyes, every single one of them is gone and he is alone.

  
He isn’t alone for long. He sees the woman, his beautiful woman. Her dress shifts colors in his mind. It is black, he knows. But it turns blue when he looks at her for too long without blinking. He sees the woman and she touches his face and her dress blurs and fades into blue and she mouths something he can’t understand and he lets go without letting his eyes close. The last thing he sees is the woman. But he isn’t worried when he starts to see nothing at all. He will see his beautiful woman again. Of this he is certain. He has never been more certain of anything… 


End file.
